Barnardo's Break The Cycle

Children’s charities have a tendency to tug on the heartstrings in order to raise awareness and contributions – but the past couple of weeks have seen a devastating new campaign for Barnardo’s launched that is more likely to rattle your ticker around its cage than tug on its strings.

Monday 24th saw the TV launch of ‘Break the Cycle’ – a shocking document of an ever-quickening cycle of crime, domestic violence, drugs and despair from which a young girl cannot break free. Through smart editing, painfully emotional scenes flash across the screen, accompanied by a relentless drumbeat of slaps, cries, mocking laughter and demands for money which escalate until the viewer is exhausted and desperate for release. Emotionally draining, the ad forces punters to see the plight of some children and the good work of Barnardo’s.

However, the startling TV spot is just the tip of the campaign’s shocking iceberg. On the charity’s website - www.barnardos.org.uk – is housed the online film ‘Hunting’. Raising the debate around the UK’s demonisation of children, the piece’s grainy, hand-held footage portrays a group of men preparing to tackle their local pest problem. It’s not until they shoot at a group of kids that the viewer learns that every line of their dialogue was written by members of the public about children on newspaper websites (including the shocking line, ‘shoot a few and if that doesn’t work, shoot a few more’).



A direct element to the campaign can be found in the accompanying digital work – viewable here and here - in which the user is invited to interact with the characters from Barnardo’s point of view. An abusive teenage girl shouting at the camera just wants to be told she is worth something. When the viewer clicks on the scream during her rant a voice over translates what she is actually trying to say if only someone would listen. A violent boy destroying his cell is literally crying out for a human touch. The clear call to action at the end of each execution invites viewers to learn more about Barnardo’s work and about what they themselves can do to help.

Speaking of the project Nick Gill, ECD at BHH says, ‘Our new Barnardo’s campaign uses TV and ground-breaking digital banners to drive home the message that even the most troubled children need rescuing’. Barnardo’s UK Director of Communications Diana Tickell adds, “The campaign seeks to remind the public that the children we chastise, fear, expel, despise and lock up, are still children. There is a story behind the behaviour of many of our youth and as a nation we seem to have lost our empathy’.

Shocking and emotive, the new campaign certainly gets its point across. Regardless as to whether it will inspire a heap of folk to dig deep and send over their pennies, the spots and accompanying digital work will certainly make most think twice before judging an unfamiliar youth.